A new analysis from the Electronic Frontier Foundation, reported by 404 Media, found that police officers have entered thousands of frivolous or nonsensical reasons when searching Flock automated license plate camera data. The reason box, intended to document why an officer is looking up a vehicle, instead contains entries such as “LMAO,” “IDK,” “hehe,” and “asdfg.” Other examples include “idiot,” “WEIRD KID,” “blah,” and “leave me alone.”
The EFF’s findings suggest that the safeguards around police use of surveillance tools are not being taken seriously in practice. Flock cameras are widely deployed in communities, and the reason field is meant to create a record that can be audited. When officers fill it with jokes or random keystrokes, that record becomes meaningless.
Because this report is based on a single source, the full scope of the problem is unclear. However, the examples themselves point to a broader issue: without meaningful enforcement of record-keeping rules, automated surveillance systems can be used casually, with little accountability for how or why they are accessed.